Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line

Workers Viewpoint Organization

Strategy and Tactics: OL & RCP Revise Marxism on the International Situation

First Published:Workers Viewpoint, Vol. 2, No. 1, January 1977.Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul SabaCopyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.

The October League’s counter-revolutionary line in support of the Shah of Iran and its distortion of Chairman Mao’s proletarian internationalist line is known to all. The OL cuts out two of the three principles of his line:

[l]to develop relations of friendship, mutual assistance and co-operation among the countries in the socialist camp [this was written in 1963, before the break-up of the socialist camp–ed] in accordance with the principle of proletarian internationalism [2] to strive for peaceful co-existence on the basis of the Five Principles with countries having different social systems and oppose the imperialist policies of aggression and war [3] and to support and assist the revolutionary struggles of all the oppressed peoples and nations. These three aspects are inter-related and indivisible, and not a single one can be omitted. (General Line of the International Communist Movement, 1963, FLP)

The OL opportunistically interprets China’s foreign policy as consisting only of the state-to-state component. And on one hand, by putting a news black out on accounts of the heroic Iranian people’s struggles, and on the other hand by playing up Iran and China’s state-to-state relations and the Shah of Iran, the OL is distorting Chairman Mao’s line on Proletarian Internationalism.

In their recent pathetic “left” feint, the OL is trying hard to look “left” to cover its history of right opportunism. However, only assimilating half-digested bits and pieces of the Marxist line of the WVO, i.e., on the direction of the main blow, and by striking a pose and adopting a “staunch look” on the question of liberals and reformists, the OL in fact has only flipped into the marsh of Trotskyism. For example, in their December 13th issue of the Call, the OL got carried away with denunciations of the liberals, so carried away in fact that they even called Echeverria, the former President of Mexico, a “liberal” and a direction of main blow for the U.S. proletariat. Only vaguely mentioning something about U.S. imperialism having interests in Mexico, the December 13th Call went on to direct the main blow at liberals in Mexico:

Liberals, represented by Echeverria and Lopez Portillo in this case, are seeking to cool the peasants’ anger by parceling out a small fraction of the land, while beating and jailing peasant leaders...Tailing after the liberals, the revisionist Communist Party of Mexico has oppossed the take overs...preaching that occupation of the land would only anger the liberal bourgeoisie... (Call, Dec. 13, 1976, p. 8)

So dazzled are they with their “left” feint, the OL forgot, just forgot, the difference between the “liberal” imperialist, who is part of the monopoly capitalist class, like Kennedy and Roosevelt, of the oppressor country, and the “liberal” national bourgeoisie of the oppressed country, such as Echeverria of Mexico.

Just forgetting this “slight” difference, the renegade Klonsky slipped into the classical social-chauvinism of the renegade Kautsky-type. It is a straight-up Trotskyite line. But the OL has been so carried away with their philistine line, that they have recently been mouthing it as if it’s something new.’ Unbelievable, isn’t it. So now the OL vacillators ended up holding two incorrect lines at the same time. One – they placed 3rd World countries struggle against the Superpowers above the Marxist-Leninist line of supporting “countries want independence, nations want liberation, and the people want revolution”, for example, on the question of the Shah of Iran. And two, a Trotskyite line of treating the “liberal” imperialist on the same footing as the “liberal” national bourgeoisie, who oppress the people but also resist the Superpowers, like Echeverria.

What gives rise to this unheard of, unprincipled state of affairs?

The answer lies in the OL’s thoroughgoing theoretical bankruptcy, which the WVO has pointed out for years. Comrades must remember that for years now the OL has confused the objective, or the target of proletarian strategy, and the “direction of the main blow.”

In the May 1975 issue of the WVO Journal, #3, we pointed out that “the OL and Carl Davidson of the Guardian repeatedly interchange the term “direction of the main blow” (i.e. the false leaders of the working class, the social props of the bourgeoisie) and the “Objective of the revolution” (p. 12) as well as the question of whether the united front is a strategy or tactic.

OL, RCP DISTORT THE DIRECTION OF THE MAIN BLOW

What is the direction of the main blow and what is the content of the OL’s “innovation” that Soviet Social-Imperialism is in fact the direction of main blow? What is the RCP’s position on the direction of the main blow? And why is their position also incorrect and, in fact, a position permitting them to mutate, in the fashion of the notorious Guardian, away from the correct verdict on the nature and role of Soviet Social-Imperialism?

Lenin applied the content of the direction of main blow in the struggle against Czarism during the first stage, the bourgeois democratic stage of the Russian Revolution. In that struggle, Stalin summed up: “Direction of Main Blow: liberal-monarchist bourgeoisie, which was serving to win over the peasantry and liquidate the revolution by a compromise with Tsarism.” (Foundations of Leninism, Stalin).

Lenin vividly described the class nature and class relations of the liberal bourgeoisie represented by the Cadets, and the motion of other classes in class struggle. For example, the Cadets were the social props in the first stage of revolution. On their class character, Lenin remarked:

It is to the advantage of the Russian liberal to pose before the Russian readers as a representative of the whole ’democratic opposition’ in general....when the Cadet looks to the right he draws distinct lines of ’class contradiction’: here the nobility, there the big bourgeoisie. But the moment the liberal turns his glance to the left, he puts the word ’class contradiction’ in ironical quotation marks. The class distinction disappear; the liberal, the capacity of a general ’democratic opposition, are supposed to represent the peasants, the workers and the urban democrats (urban petty bourgeoisie.–ed) (Lenin, “Political Parties in the Five Years of the Third Duma”)

The liberals need voters, they need a crowd that would trust and follow them (in order to compel the Purishkevivhes to make room), but they fear the political independence of the crowds. (Lenin, “Liberalism and Democracy”)

As we can see here, Lenin’s understanding of the social prop is based on class analysis, class struggle, and its motion. The OL, in copping to a correct line only in form, is copping only to the phrases and words, for example, as we illustrated before, using the term liberal bourgeoisie in both the U.S. and in Mexico (which is very dangerous) in the same way. This again, of course, is something these hopeless pedants like OL and Nicholaus cannot help but practice that.

Using a similar methodology of grasping class analysis and changes in class relations, Lenin and Stalin summed up the role of the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries as the direction of the main blow during the 2nd stage of the Russian revolution. For they strove to put an end to the revolution by compromising with the imperialists because of their fear of the working class and its revolutionary alliance with the lower and middle peasantry.

After the Feb. 1917 bourgeois democratic revolution, Lenin put forth the thesis that the bourgeois democratic revolution cannot be consummated as in the old bourgeois democratic revolutions led by the bourgeoisie. Discarding right doctrinairism, Lenin took advantage of the fact that the bourgeoisie was not firmly in power, that political power was actually in the Soviets, and that the poor peasants were the direct reserves of the proletariat, not the bourgeoisie. He put forth the line that there is no great wall between the two revolutions and called for the socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat. A key to victory was his line of the direction of the main blow, exposing the line of the Socialist Revolutionaries, the Mensheviks and Anarchists step by step and showing that they ran counter to the interests of the working people.

The Bolshevik Party carried on extensive political exposure work in the course of putting forward the positive program of the Bolsheviks, at the front and in the rear, and especially in the Soviets winning over the majority in the Soviets changing the balance (from less than 301 of the Soviets in the hands of the Bolsheviks and 701 in the hands of the Mensheviks and other opportunists, into a majority for the Bolsheviks)between the months of February and October, 1917.

The change of class relations in the brief few months resulted from the development of the Socialist Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, etc. as petty bourgeois parties into fully bourgeois parties which fought for the preservation and development of capitalism in Russia. This is basically the reason why the target and the direction of the main blow changed.

However, the OL Mensheviks typically discard class analysis, class relations, and use their prejudices in developing strategy and tactics for the US proletariat. For instance, their line towards the NAACP as a direct reserve of the proletariat, their historical unity with Hosea Williams, Arnold Miller, Ceasar Chavez and now Hays Holdstein, their support of the Busing plans and the ERA, Proposition 14, etc., all speak to the fact that they didn’t and still can’t understand the role of the labor aristocracy, seemingly militant misleaders, etc., who are actually the most effective social props of the bourgeoisie. Social props come from the labor aristocracy and the petty bourgeoisie. They are agents of the bourgeoisie inside the workers and national movements. This ignorance is deep and remains, despite the OL’s pretensions that they now “hate” liberals. It is reflected in their usage of the term “liberal bourgeoisie”. This terminology implies that the bourgeoisie is divided into “liberal” and “conservative” wings, not seeing that “liberal” or “conservative” are tactics of the bourgeoisie. Largely, finance capitalists in the US have no intrinsic interests in either “liberal” or “conservative” covers. They adopt now one, now another tactic, according to the need, according to the time and conditions. This is done, principally, to conform to the need to fool the workers and, secondarily, for in-fights within the bourgeoisie.

Such labels(conservative, liberal) are misleading, and out of date, in the context of the massive problems that we face. Rather I would say that today, we must be conservative in our loyalty to eternal truths that define nature, the freedom, the dignity of man...We must be liberal in our constant and tireless quest to find ever new ways to meet ever new threats to this freedom and dignity. (Unity, Freedom and Peace)

So it’s clear that liberalism and conservativism are all tactics of the bourgeoisie, the real monopoly, finance capitalists, today. But our OL liberals, after over three years of our open polemics with them on this question(though seeming to have moved forward, at least in now adopting the term “direction of the main blow”) still seems to be mentally and physically in 1905 Russia! For the “liberal bourgeoisie” then in Russia genuinely did represent a democratic force against the autocracy and feudalism. But the “liberal” bourgeoisie in this country is liberalism in quotation marks, nothing except some of the biggest finance capitalist who can afford the best “public relations” men, bourgeois ideologists, and “liberal” think tankers to scheme and plan for the bourgeoisie on how best to exploit and deceive the working class. Even so, their liberal tactics inevitably are accompanied by increased repression. But the OL is still stuck in 1905 Russia by thinking that they are really a “liberal” bourgeoisie, sections of the monopoly capitalists who are the democratic opposition to the “conservative” bourgeoisie. OL “Klonskyism” is a belief that there are intrinsic interests for a section of the bourgeoisie to be “liberal” and intrinsic interests for a section of the bourgeoisie to be “conservative”. This is a petty bourgeois frame of mind, a petty bourgeois prejudice and pious wish. No amount of “left” feinting by the OL can feint away their petty bourgeois democratic class outlook. However, when they do feint, this rightist outlook gives rise to a peculiar “left” trotskyite deviation and social chauvinism. In regard to the issue of Mexico’s struggle for independence against US Imperialism, “where is the OL at now?”. They are on the side of the US Imperialists, both “liberals” and “conservatives”!!!

THE OL’S FLIP IS NOW AIMING THE DIRECTION OF THE MAIN BLOW AT ECHEVERRIA

The OL’s direction of the main blow against Echeverria not only suffers from social chauvinism, but Trotskyism, because objectively they don’t recognize the existence of imperialism and the second period in the national question, where generally national liberation movements and countries want independence, weaken the grip of imperialism, and particularly the superpowers, and objectively act in the interests of the proletariat.

Why? Because in China and other semi-feudal, semi-colonial countries, the national bourgeoisie, unlike the imperialist bourgeoisie, is politically, ideologically, and economically flabby. The bourgeoisie is divided into the compradore and national bourgeoisie. The compradore bourgeoisie(and its political party, if it exists) is part of the target of the revolution(part of the three great mountains: imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucrat capitalism). The basis for the political, economic, and ideological flabbiness of the national bourgeoisie is primarily imperialist plunder and secondarily the stagnant inertia of feudalism. For these reasons, they have a dual character, vacillating between the forces of imperialism and the forces of revolution. They try to seek an impossible middle road – the free development of capitalism in their country. For similar reasons, they have no mass influence and lack the deceptive quality of mis-leaders and props in advanced capitalist countries.

The compradore bourgeoisie and feudal regimes are readily exposed for their outright national betrayal and because of their direct repressive method of rule (as distinct from rule through bourgeois democracy). There is no fertile ground for breeding reformists and social democrats that might come forward in the course of revolution, no broad material basis for nurturing reformism, no superprofits to bribe a strata of ’labor aristocracy’ in the same way the imperialist bourgeoisie do at home.

CHAIRMAN MAO’S TEACHINGS ON STRATEGY AND TACTICS IN RELATION TO NATIONAL BOURGEOISIE

On this point Chairman Mao, in his writings concerning the New Democratic ’revolution, is very clear. He said that the direction of the main blow in China, an oppressed country, must be aimed at the main enemy. That was the content of one of the ten major line struggles, the line struggle waged against Wang Ming, who dogmatically applied this “direction of main blow” at the middle forces and ended up serving the imperialists and the compradore KMT.

In Third World countries, the imperialists do not necessarily use social props to maintain their repressive rule and deflect the blows of the revolutionary forces; they usually rely on military props, direct military repression to maintain state power.

We pointed this out in the Sept.-Oct. issue of the WVO newspaper that:

Chairman Mao’s most important enrichment of Marxist-Leninist teaching on the question of strategy and tactics is his teaching that in China, where the national bourgeoisie is politically weak, the direction of main blow should not be aimed at the middle forces, the vacillators, such as the national bourgeoisie and bourgeois democrats. In imperialist countries, advanced capitalist, super profits can successfully buy off a bribed strata of the proletariat, the labor aristocracy; and other factors enable the bourgeoisie to rule through the dual tactic of the social prop and the military prop (the priest and the hangman). In countries like China, though there are individuals who served such a role for a brief period of time (like Hu Shih, a lackey of U.S. imperialism), there was no fertile material basis for the existence of such a strata comparable to liberals, social props, and seemingly endless strains of reformist misleaders in advanced capitalist countries.

This difference is because China, being semi-feudal and semi-colonial, did not have bourgeois democracy as a form of rule. The bourgeoisie in China was extremely weak politically and culturally. The bourgeoisie’s right-wing was the compradore bourgeoisie, tailing after the Western bourgeoisie at every turn, and were out and out traitors to the Chinese people. These forces were quickly differentiated from the Chinese masses. The “left” wing were patriotic and many of them broke with the KMT. Of course, all of them have dual aspects. But based on these factors and national oppression, middle forces, vacillating though they were, didn’t and couldn’t serve as a significant social prop to shield or prolong imperialist plunder. The main blow therefore was aimed at the imperialists, KMT, the targets of the united front at definite stages of the New Democratic Revolution. This has special significance in terms of applying Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tse-Tung Thought’s teachings on strategy and tactics to many Third World countries around the world today, where there are similar economic and political systems as in pre-liberation China. (WVO newspaper, p. 24-5, Sept.-Oct. 1976)

This is something that neither OL nor the RCP can understand, being theoretically bankrupt and dishonest and unwilling to understand the real content of the concept ’direction of the main blow’ as to why, how, and under what concrete conditions of time and place it was formulated and applied.

RCP’S VIEW ON “DIRECTION OF THE MAIN BLOW”

While the OL flips from liquidating the direction of main blow (i.e. historically, their line that liberals and militant trade union misleaders are direct reserves of the proletariat, rather than the direction of the main blow) to their “everything is liberal” line, the RCP, to their “credit”, still stubbornly holds onto their consistently opportunist line that Stalin was wrong on the question of the direction of main blow. They claim special knowledge that “the Chinese disagree with the concept of the direction of main blow.”

RCP: STALIN’S LINE ON DIRECTION OF THE MAIN BLOW

Both these two points are pure demagogy, typical RU style. Both the two points RCP makes are, in fact, lies, simply their own fabrication. On the first point, that the direction of main blow is only Stalin’s line, is a lie. It was Lenin, in the main, who led the October Revolution. And Stalin summed it up, the content of the Leninist line on the direction of main blow (whether he called it that or not is not important) is evident in his own writings. The quotes by Lenin we gave before on the Cadets illustrate that he in fact generalized that concept and applied it to the advanced capitalist countries in the West. For example, in his famous “Theses on Comintern Fundamental Tasks,” he used the content of the very same concept of the “direction of main blow” in relation to the question of “What immediate and universal preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat should consist in,” he said that:

Owing to the extreme intensification of the struggle, all groups, parties, and leaders in the working class movement who have fully or partly adopted the stand of reformism, of the ’Centre’, etc. inevitably side with the bourgeoisie or join the waverers or else (what is the most dangerous of all) (our emphasis) land in the ranks of the unreliable friends of the victorious proletariat. Hence, preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat calls, not only for an intensification of the struggle against reformist ’Centrist’ tendencies, but also for a change in the character of that struggle. The struggle cannot be restricted to explaining the erroneousness of these tendencies; it must unswervingly and ruthlessly expose any leader of the working class movement who reveals such tendencies, for otherwise the proletariat cannot know who it will march with into the decisive struggle against the bourgeoisie. This struggle is such that at any moment it may – and actually does, as experience has shown – substitute criticism with weapons for the weapon of criticism. Any inconsistency or weakness in exposing those who show themselves to the reformist or ’Centrists’ means directly increasing the danger or the power of the proletariat being overthrown by the bourgeoisie, which tomorrow will utilise for the counter-revolution that which short-sighted people today see merely as ’theoretical differences.’” (Lenin, Theses on the Fundamental Tasks of the Second Congress of the Communist International, 1920, LCW, Vol.32)

This thesis was written for the Second Congress of the Communist International, and he was addressing this point to the delegates of advanced capitalist countries at that time. So RCP certainly cannot attribute this concept as a Stalin’s line or as a “mistake” of Stalin.

A reversal of the verdict on this question will lead to wholesale repudiation of Stalin’s leadership and thus the Comintern’s line during the entire period between Lenin’s death and the Second World War. It will lead to a reversal of Comintern’s line in advanced capitalist countries, particularly Stalin’s and Comintern’s correct line towards the betrayal of the Social Democratic Parties, and it would lead us to close our eyes to the concrete history of how wretched revisionists ushered in Fascism in Austria, Germany, and Italy. RU’s attack on Stalin on this question would in fact open the flood gates for Trotskyism, for Trotsky had the same disagreement with Stalin and Lenin on this question.

DEVIATION MADE IN CHINESE REVOLUTION

Were there ever mistakes made on this question? Certainly there were. All Marxist concepts and generalizations can lead to errors if they are taken only literally and not by their spirit and content. Errors can be made by applying them outside the context of concrete time, place, and conditions. For example, the Chinese Trotskyite-turned-revisionist Wang Ming dogmatically applied this line and caused great set-backs to the Chinese revolution. His line of hitting the middle forces did not recognize that there are middle forces and middle forces, intermediate strata and intermediate strata. There can be different classes which play different roles in different revolutions based on their own concrete conditions.

This is precisely because he doesn’t use class analysis and doesn’t understand imperialism and the colonial question. Instead, he used the ’formula’.

Did Chairman Mao, in the name of the inapplicability of this or that historical experience of China, ever deny its applicability in other countries where the conditions are different? Never!

RCP’s “source” on this question is nothing but a Chinese pamphlet, “The Historical Experience of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat,” published in 1956.

This point was laid out in this pamphlet:

But there are two ways of studying them, the Marxist way and the doctrinaire way. Some people treat Stalin’s writings in a doctrinaire manner, with the result that they cannot analyse and see what is correct and what is not correct – and even what is correct they treat as a panacea and apply indiscriminately; inevitably they make mistakes. For instance, Stalin put forward a formula that in different revolutionary periods, the main blow should be so directed as to isolate the middle of the road social and political forces of the time. This formula of Stalin’s should be treated according to circumstances and from a critical, Marxist point of view. In certain circumstances it may be correct to isolate the middle forces, but it is not correct to isolate them under all circumstances. Our experience [note they qualify it as their own experience] teaches us that the main blow of the revolution should be directed at the chief enemy to isolate them, while as for the middle forces, a policy of both uniting with them and struggling against them should be adopted, so that they are at least neutralized; and, as circumstances permit, efforts should be made to shift them from their position of neutrality to one of alliance with us...when some of our comrades crudely applied this formula of Stalin’s to China’s revolution by turning their main attack on the middle forces, singling them out as the most dangerous enemy, the result was that, instead of isolating the teal enemy, we isolated ourselves ...the middle forces in question consisted of the national bourgeoisie, the democratic parties and groups, and democrats without party affiliation...The invariable fact is: doctrinairism is appreciated only by the mentally lazy; it brings nothing but harm to the revolution, to the people, and to Marxism-Leninism. To enhance the initiative of the masses, to stimulate their dynamic creative spirit, and to promote rapid development of practical and theoretical work, it is still necessary, right now, to destroy blind faith in dogma.

It is necessary to quote this source, since it’s not widely available and our “theoreticians” in RCP would always distort this “rare” source in any way they can to gain points in their “polemics” in a serious matter as this.

Certainly on this concept of the direction of the main blow, the RCP is doing exactly the opposite of what the Chinese comrades advised, namely, not to adopt mechanically what’s applicable, or not applicable in one country to another. The direction of main blow is not applicable in China, as the Chinese comrades cautiously said: “Our experience teaches” us that. But they are, as all genuine communists, cautious in not denying its applicability in other countries. As they said, “This formula of Stalin’s should be treated according to circumstances and from a critical, Marxist point of view. In certain circumstances, it may be correct....” This the RCP conveniently neglects. And instead they boast that it is generally not applicable at all. Not in the U.S. or any where else. Aren’t these RCP “theoreticians” exactly like those the Chinese comrades described as “mentally lazy”? Those that would transplant the experience in China to the U.S., while negating it’s applicability in Russia and other advanced capitalist countries? This point needs no more elaboration.

Their opportunist line of “roll on and roll over” the trade union hacks reveals the depths of R“C”P’s thoroughly pragmatic outlook and vulgar materialist understanding of strategy and tactics. Their pragmatic line liquidates the necessity to do meticulous political and ideological work among the masses to expose the real ties that the trade union misleaders have with the state in misleading the masses and deflecting our blows against the bourgeoisie.

The R“C”P liquidates the need to do thorough political education in the thick of class struggle, to win over and lead those that are confused or are temporarily misled by the social props.

Their line does not prepare the masses in each struggle and each strike to steel ourselves against the different varieties of the bourgeoisie’s “sugar coated bullets” and tricks. Their line reveals no Marxist Leninist understanding of the role that misleaders play in propping up the bourgeoisie and no strategic outlook on the question. Instead, their line pragmatically worships the masses in motion. Without years of thorough-going, meticulous exposure work, the masses will not know under which flag to march to the revolution and will not be ideologically and politically prepared for bringing about and exercising the dictatorship of the proletariat.

“ROLL ON AND ROLL OVER”: RCP’S OWN VERSION OF THE DIRECTION OF THE MAIN BLOW

In practice, however, these “mentally lazy” pragmatic “theoreticians” are in fact quite creative. And, of course, this seemingly staunch “roll on and roll over” line actually liquidates political exposure, political education of the working class on the political role of the trade union misleaders as well as preparing the masses for the dictatorship of the proletariat.

BOTH SUPERPOWERS ARE THE TARGETS OF REVOLUTION: U.S. IMPERIALISM IS MORE EXPOSED; SOVIET SOCIAL-IMPERIALISM IS MORE HIDDEN AND DANGEROUS

On the international situation, this same line, which in essence does not distinguish, as what Malcolm X once put it, the difference between the “wolf and the fox,” shows that the RCP does not and can not tell the difference between U.S. imperialism and Soviet Social-Imperialism. Flowing from this line, they don’t distinguish Soviet Social-Imperialism (which is more sinister, more dangerous, since it flys the flag of “socialism,” than the U.S. imperialists, which is most thoroughly exposed in the last two, three decades) in comparison to the Soviet Social-Imperialists (which is only beginning to be exposed to the people of the world).

This line of not distinguishing the “wolf from the fox” is essentially the line that does not view the Soviet Social-Imperialists as the most dangerous(in the sense of the most treacherous and the most deceptive, the hidden danger to many) of the two main enemies of the people of the world – the Two Superpowers.

It is not accident, then, that the pragmatist RU only sees Soviet Social-Imperialism as a main danger to China, and not to the people of the world in all continents, in all corners of the world. Because they see danger only as a direct physical threat so they view Soviet Social-Imperialism as only the main danger to China, since the Soviet Union is right next to China. In any case, certainly the RCP is inching its way, in the manner of the Guardian in the last few years, to reverse the verdict on the role and nature of the Soviet Social-Imperialist This line certainly can justify this.

AVAKIAN, WORD MAGICIAN: “FIGHT APPEASEMENT”?

In the RCP’s recent international conference, in which the RCP was attempting to apply the line of “winning over the middle forces”, but in fact conciliated to all forms of opportunism, Avakian demagogically tried to muddle the question of the “main danger” and justify the RCP’s emerging centrist line on this question of Soviet Social-Imperialism by posing the point this way:

...what does it mean for U.S. revolutionaries, the working class and people in the U.S. to so-call ’fight appeasement’ and fight against a section of the ruling class that carries out so-called ’appeasement policies,’ the way it is being raised by some like Hinton and the OL and others like today. It means urging our own imperialists to be more vigorous in carrying out their own imperialist aims and intentions for domination, exploitation and oppression. (Revolution, Dec. 1976)

Now, forces like the OL, as we pointed our earlier, certainly don’t know what they are talking about. And we also disagree with Hinton’s “neutralizing U.S. imperialism” line. But the point is precisely that the Soviet Social-Imperialists are the main danger and therefore their detente scheme, as well as the appeasement line of some U.S. monopoly interests, must be exposed. Exposure of detente and appeasement is extremely important. Chairman Mao formulated the line to expose appeasement and detente, to educate the people of the world in order to prepare the people, to alert the people so they can turn world war around to revolution in as many countries as possible. These are some reasons why we must expose detente and appeasement – as it is the fastest, most deceptive and quickest way to world war. The demagogy of the. RCP is, by playing with semantics, changes the term “exposure of appeasement” to “fight appeasement.”

RCP, in debating the OL, is actually looking for a bogus target to hit. In debating the spineless OL, the RU tries to make themselves look good. But they are just opportunist twins that complement each other so well!!

Avakian, by demagogically toying with sophistry, by twisting words and playing with semantics, by changing “exposure of appeasement” to “fight appeasement,” objectively makes people think that raising vigilance on appeasement and detente is actually holding the line of siding with one imperialist to fight another. This is, of course, totally sham. There’ is no such thing as “fight appeasement.” Appeasement itself is a dangerous line, which feeds the other imperialist’s appetite, provoking its wild ambitions.The main thing is whether communists recognize and expose the danger of the appeasement line. Whether we realize that the Soviet Social-Imperialists are more dangerous in the sense of being younger, leaner, more disguised, sinister then the U.S. imperialists. Based on that, there is the need to make that distinction to warm the working class and other oppressed people and countries of the world. In refusing to make such a distinction, the RCP inevitiably aids the Soviet Social-Imperialism and do great harm to the US proletariat as well as peoples around the world struggling against the Superpowers.

PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION AND THE RENEGADE KLONSKY

Another gem that OL peddles is that Soviet. Social-Imperialism is the “direction of main blow.” So dazzled are they with their latest “discovery” of the concept of the main blow, they are becoming creative. What is the implication of stating that the Soviet Social-imperialists are the direction of the main blow? The first implication is that Soviet Social-Imperialism is not the objective or the target of the proletarian strategy to defeat both superpowers to push revolution forward. The second implication of the OL’s line is that Soviet Social-Imperialism is actually the social prop of the U.S. imperialists, for the direction of main blow is aimed at the social props, the props that support or compromise with the target of our strategy. This “creative” line of the OL then inevitably leads to a Kautskyite “ultra-imperialism” line – that imperialism is a “preferred policy”, which alternates according to the sensibilities of the imperialists, therefore that the inter-imperialist contradiction is not inevitable and is in fact reconcilable, that Soviet Social-Imperialism can compromise or support U:S. imperialism. Therefore collusion is their nature, and not contention. No. Mr. Klonsky, you are as creative as Mr. Kautsky! Soviet Social-Imperialism cannot prop up or support U.S. Imperialism any more than a killer fox can “support” a killer wolf! To say that they can co-exist or that one supports the other is nothing but the ultra-imperialist line of the revisionist Second International.

The proletariat’s line is to treat both superpowers as the target of our strategy. For the U.S. proletariat it is our duty to directly fight U.S. Imperialism. For the proletariat in the Soviet Union and other countries that the Soviet Social-Imperialist occupy, it is their duty to directly fight and defeat them. However, it is the duty of the proletariat and oppressed masses in all countries to expose the role of the SSI, the more dangerous, the more sinister, of the two superpowers. This is a proletarian internationalist duty of the U.S. proletariat in order to support the working class and people of the Soviet Union and the countries that SSI occupies.

It is necessary for the political education of the U.S. proletariat. As the danger of world war grows, due to the superpowers’ contention, it is also necessary for us to support national liberation struggles correctly (for example, Angola, Chile). Most important of all, it is necessary for us to make immediate preparation for the dictatorship of the proletariat, for the noble goal of communism.